Sunday, January 29, 2012

REVIEW: 50/50 (2011)

Cancer is not a light subject and not one that many mainstream movies
get made about. When they do, it’s usually within the frame of a very heavy
drama, with little room for anything else, and that is where 50/50 comes in to
demolish those expectations. This is a very wholesome film that answers the
question I was wondering ever since I saw the trailer: “How can you inject
comedy into a movie about a guy getting cancer?” Well, 50/50 did that with a
splendid turn out.

Joseph Gordon Levitt is a great young actor and this film shows why –
he’s able to fit himself into a role and cloak himself in it to where you don’t
really think of him as an actor. In his best movies like Mysterious Skin, he
fully becomes the character. He doesn’t try too hard to showboat or win any
Oscars, he just puts out consistently excellent performances, no bells and
whistles, no gimmicks. He’s awesome. Seth Rogen, famous for God knows how many trashy
comedy movies over the last few years, pretty much does what you would expect
of him here – silly, boisterous and loud – but the character is well written
and nuanced to where he’s actually fairly compelling by the end. Anna Kendrick,
of Up in the Air fame, puts on a great performance too as Levitt’s therapist.
She is soft and feminine and kind of awkward, but she has a good spirit and a
spunky sort of beat to her personality.

The movie kicks into gear relatively quickly with Levitt getting the
big news that he has cancer. The film likes to straddle a line between comedy
and drama, with a very serious scene here and there and others more speckled
with jokes and wry witticisms. Levitt’s comedic timing comes from his stoic,
deadpan delivery – what else would you expect from a guy who has cancer? He’s
matched pretty brilliantly by Rogen’s brazenness.

Overall, 50/50 is a fairly simple and straightforward tale. It’s the
story of a young man who gets cancer and has to face the painful road ahead to
recovery. The strongest moments in the film are hard to pick out because it’s a
whole movie of strong moments. The strength of the whole is its characters, and
the way they interact with one another. Levitt’s interactions with Rogen are a
big highlight of the movie, as they’re funny and also insightful into both
characters’ finer points. Levitt talks to his mother and girlfriend a fair few
times in the film – one of those relationships tanks and the other one ends up
flourishing and stronger than ever, and the juxtaposition shows how versatile
the actors and directors are. He talks to his therapist (Kendrick) quite often
too. I have to admit Kendrick’s storyline does feel a little rushed in
comparison to some of the others, but it’s a minor complaint at best.

We learn about all the characters through conversation and as the film
unfolds, we see a broad, spirited picture of human tragedy. The human condition
is never limited strictly to the person directly inflicted by some terrible
ailment; it also affects those around him or her too, and part of what this
movie tells us is that it’s not necessarily morally reprehensible to show that
you’re just as grief-stricken as the person who is sick to begin with. People
always say that nothing anyone is feeling about a loved one’s sickness or
ailment can compare with what the person is feeling him- or herself, and that
is true to some extent, but everyone is affected a little bit and has to deal
with it just the same. There is no hierarchy of grieving and distress. Some
people deal with the pain and suffering of their loved ones in good ways, and
others do not – such is the way of life and human error.

The reasons why 50/50 is a great film are plentiful – the acting, the
directing, the pacing – but overall the film is more than the sum of its parts.
It is a tale of laughing and crying, of the ways we interact with those around
us – for we are never just individual souls cut off from the world, we are all
interconnected. 50/50 is the story of those connections and how they come together
in the face of possible death. This is an honest movie about people doing what
they can.

All images copyright of their original owners. I do not own any of them.